Why doesn't anyone ever attempt to break Rare Bear's speed record?

[MMPerk]

Re: Why doesn't anyone ever attempt to break Rare Bear's speed record?

I just watched some film of Lyle's record setting 3km run. And it backs up everything I've heard about it. It is by no means an easy task...and for sure...not something you just decide to up and go do. There are plenty of rumors and speculation on at least two of the current records that 'Rare Bear' holds. I look forward to seeing what really shakes loose over the next two or three years.

LP

[MRussell]

Re: Why doesn't anyone ever attempt to break Rare Bear's speed record?

Oh you mean that whole turbine biplane thing? zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

[hm66sk]

Re: Why doesn't anyone ever attempt to break Rare Bear's speed record?

Good post, and it got me thinking. Your point can be summarized with a look at Rod Lewis' purchase of the Rare Bear... he didn't just get the airplane. He was damn lucky to get as many of the longtime team members as he did. Can we imagine how monumental his task would be if he only got the engine/airframe/hangar but had to start with a green crew?

BUT, on the flipside, is Michael Phelps obligated to disclose his nuance training secrets after he retires? What about Michael Schumacher or Tiger Woods? Let's put it another way... since Lyle Shelton retired from air racing, is he obligated to share with up-and-coming Unlimited pilots his secrets to a fast lap? Sometimes it happens when an old-hand chooses to mentor an apprentice, as is likely what we're witnessing with Tiger, Steve Sr, and Steve Jr. It explains Jr's good performance at an early age.

I see engine building as the same thing. The "human factor" is the biggest part of any sport, and in air racing the human factor is as much the engine builder as it is the pilot. The human life cycle is a sad-but-unavoidable part of the human factor in a sport. Look at the best football coaches we've ever seen.

In any professional sport, you need that "perfect storm" of coach, raw materials, money, all the team members, and supporting cast. Then you need some luck and some favorable weather conditions. While the sport will continue indefinitely after the perfect storm has dissipated into the history books, I don't think any member of a perfect storm team is obligated in any way to recreate for others what they did for their team.

You are correct and cited some excellent examples. I guess everyone has the right to be selfish. I think this just strikes a nerve with me because in my younger years I went to pursue the profession of building these engines and was turned away by one of the aforementioned individuals with basically a "Not interested." answer. Kinda shattered my dreams. Your right about most motorsports unfortunately being this way now. Back in the day, you'd be building parts and working on the car for the guy you were about to race!

[GeeBeeZ1931]

Re: Why doesn't anyone ever attempt to break Rare Bear's speed record?

Now why is he so intent on keeping this stuff a secret and "letting someone else figure it out." Arrogance? The old "If I can figure it out, you can too." attitude. Now, please don't get the wrong and take the wrong mindset here. I have great respect for the Thorns, Hoveys, and Nixons of the community. They have contributed greatly to the sport and keeping the warbirds flying. But, if they don't pass on this knowledge, who is going to keep these birds in the air for the future?

Let's be fair. Is it just maybe possible that the master believes that there's someone else(or elses)out there with the ability to have his own "Eureka!" moment just as he did and he's allowing that to happen naturally without just giving it away to someone who wouldn't have figured it out? And maybe, just maybe he can foresee that someone else MIGHT come up with an even better way if their thinking isn't first corrupted by his ideas?
Bill K

[FuryFan]

Re: Why doesn't anyone ever attempt to break Rare Bear's speed record?

Bingo! Who's to say that Mr. Thorne has built the ultimate Merlin? Anyone that is going to build the next "mouse" probably has 98% of the knowledge that they need. That last 2% of innovation has to be earned to be truely understood. IMHO

Kevin

[First time Juke]

Re: Why doesn't anyone ever attempt to break Rare Bear's speed record?

I think Tsunami went well beyond 540 mph in one attempt..but not average. I recall Elbarto knows about this.

It is very very expensive to build a racer ( like Dart ) and you have no protos to go with it ( Heston J-5 etc speak about this ). Therefore Mustang and Bearcat ( because of its size ) are only valid candidates.

Maybe a Heinkel He 100 D with 3500 hps could be made to reach those 520+ mph speeds of the old historical planes without much altering it ( clipping wings and new engine for sure ). I doubt there are any technical drawings left of them either.

[MRussell]

Re: Why doesn't anyone ever attempt to break Rare Bear's speed record?

Bingo! Who's to say that Mr. Thorne has built the ultimate Merlin? Anyone that is going to build the next "mouse" probably has 98% of the knowledge that they need. That last 2% of innovation has to be earned to be truely understood. IMHO

Kevin

There's no doubt one of the better Formula 1 (the cars) engine houses like BMW or Ferrari could reverse engineer a Merlin and very likely make it produce 4,000shp for 20 minutes. Naturally it would have pneumatic valves, forged kryptonite rods, and an amazing reduction gearbox (probably the new weakest link) and it would sound like 5 Pond Racers stacked together, but it could absolutely be done given the right resources and interest. Competent-enough engineers are already employed elsewhere. The only reason it hasn't happened is that true air racing isn't a billion-dollar sport. But hey, if it WAS a billion-dollar sport, it wouldn't be nearly as cool as it is.

[Peashooter]

Re: Why doesn't anyone ever attempt to break Rare Bear's speed record?

Nah, they'd do the 2-cycle RR Crecy -- 5,000 bhp in the test cell.

[RichH]

Re: Why doesn't anyone ever attempt to break Rare Bear's speed record?

Let's be fair. Is it just maybe possible that the master believes that there's someone else(or elses)out there with the ability to have his own "Eureka!" moment just as he did and he's allowing that to happen naturally without just giving it away to someone who wouldn't have figured it out? And maybe, just maybe he can foresee that someone else MIGHT come up with an even better way if their thinking isn't first corrupted by his ideas?
Bill K

Um, the problem is... not enough engines/parts left for that! If there were still warehouses full of Merlin cores it would be a different story.

Unfortunate the info isn't being passed on, but the secrets are his and he has no obligation to relinquish them. Sadly enough... :/

[Pyrodude]

Re: Why doesn't anyone ever attempt to break Rare Bear's speed record?

Sorry for a partial thread hijack, but........
Is anyone going to be attending this?

http://www.enginehistory.org/Convention/2008/ConvRegForm08Web_1.pdf

Maybe they could ask the question.

Ward

[hm66sk]

Re: Why doesn't anyone ever attempt to break Rare Bear's speed record?

Let's be fair. Is it just maybe possible that the master believes that there's someone else(or elses)out there with the ability to have his own "Eureka!" moment just as he did and he's allowing that to happen naturally without just giving it away to someone who wouldn't have figured it out? And maybe, just maybe he can foresee that someone else MIGHT come up with an even better way if their thinking isn't first corrupted by his ideas?
Bill K

Yeah, you're right. I appologize for going off on my own personal tangent.

[marada mx3]

Re: Why doesn't anyone ever attempt to break Rare Bear's speed record?

Um, the problem is... not enough engines/parts left for that! If there were still warehouses full of Merlin cores it would be a different story.

Unfortunate the info isn't being passed on, but the secrets are his and he has no obligation to relinquish them. Sadly enough... :/

This is a big part of the issue, and one reason I wish the "secrets" were passed on. Every time one of the inlines (or radial for that matter)throws a rod out the side of the case, or has bearing problems and wipes out a crank or journal land, that is one less piece in a very short list of spares. I don't think anybody likes seeing the smoke trail from any racer. The same can be said of the radials. Slowly but surely, the cores are disappearing. One of these days will come - what will become of unlimited air racing when there aren't any blocks, heads, cranks, etc to build?

I understand the withholding of information stance. I worked for an engine builder that wasn't very forthcoming of information or build secrets. It is the engine builders "proprietary" information and theirs to withhold if they want. Especially if it relates to keeping their livelihood. But, at what expense is keeping that information? How many engines are lost due to the trial and error process of trying to figure out what someone already knows? How many steps backward does air racing take? Eventually, hopefully, someone will figure out these "tweaks" and we'll be right back where we once were, but how long, and at what cost and expense to the evolution of air racing and technology? Is it not for the overall good of the sport to share what we know so as to continue growing and enhancing the experience? The same thing is happening in the power generation industry - baby boomers are retiring, and taking their knowledge with them before any chance of training their replacements.

I know there are people, like Sparrow, that are working feverishly to get the V-12s to sing like they once did. I'm sure everyone wants to see a full field of healthy racers in the gold, and witness what would surely be an epic battle between the air-cooled and H2O cooled racers. Maybe this year!

Tommy

[DWYER]

Re: Why doesn't anyone ever attempt to break Rare Bear's speed record?

Well Said!!!

[cmliston]

Re: Why doesn't anyone ever attempt to break Rare Bear's speed record?

There is one simple answer to that question MONEY Yes Dago is definitely able to break that record, we just need someone to put up the money to cover the attempt.

[Matt58]

Re: Why doesn't anyone ever attempt to break Rare Bear's speed record?

God, I love this board!!! There have been a lot of very good points and opinions made in this thread; none to be discounted by me! I am a relative newcomer to this sport and my thoughts and opinions are worth less than a quart of billy goat piss on the Black Market! But, like everyone else, I have one, and it is based off my knowledge and my observations I have made through the last 5 years. I have gone over this in my head too many times since this thread started (and evolved) and I need to make sure I word everything carefully as to not get verbally kicked in the balls afterwards. So here goes...

As to the life/evolution/future of the HEALTHY race Merlin, I feel, is in a so-called mid-life crisis. And please, do not take "crisis" literally. The demand is not there. As for a stock Merlin, thats a different story.

One board member, I think, stated it perfectly. His wife's '81 'Vette, and his newer one basically have the same motor; but his puts out almost 2.5 times the horsepower. Besides the technological advances that were made in that engine, the power increase comes from the evolution of parts within and bolted to, this motor. I have built many Chevy 5.7 litre 350s, from mild to wild. My first one was bone stock with all stock, off the shelf GM Goodwrench parts and it put out somewhere around 185 hp. Then I built one with off the shelf parts from JEGS and SUMMIT and bang, 300 hp! The 350 was such a stable platform to build on that manufacturers went ape-crap trying to produce the best and baddest engine parts for it. But, one thing was there to drive it all...DEMAND!!!

This is going somewhere, I promise...

Now think back to post WWII. There are plenty of Merlins and Allisons around, and they ended up in many forms of racing; from cars to boats. This is when these engines began to evolve in the never ending quest for more horsepower. Some companies manufactured new parts for these engines that would produce more power than stock parts. But, as I know of it today, there is only one sport where a V-12 Merlin or Allison engine take center stage, and that is Air Racing. Today, there are only a handful of people/shops that can turn out a fully race-prepped Merlin. And what are they putting them in? Race Mustangs. But, there are also people/shops that turn out fully stock Merlins. And what are those going in? Restoration/flyable Mustangs. The demand is just not there for a race Merlin.

Someone had asked previously why someone can't disassemble a race Merlin and then re-engineer it. This can be done, and I am sure that the Merlin builders out there would love too, but why would they? .5% of the people that have a need for Merlin, want a race Merlin. It is not in the best interest of the Merlin builders out there to put the ungodly amounts of time and money into a undertaking such as this. But it sure would be cool!

Now when I say I think the race Merlin is in a mid-life crisis, this is what I mean: The last two-three years of Reno have seen the demise of the Race Merlin. But this is due to the fact that the builders/owners of these engines are trying to find the perfect combination of ultimate power. It has been done; as seen with Dago Red in '03, so these builders all know it is out there. But like we have seen with some builders, they feel that their knowledge is best left to them. And good for them because they have gone through the trials and tribulations of finding that perfect combination for ultimate power. Each builder of the race Merlin now, is going through those same trials and tribulations. Look at Voodoo a few years back. First they tried a different oiling system, then it was the Merlin fingers. How about Strega? Remember when they came to the show with three Race Merlins? One to go and two on the shelf (i think)? The first one went then the other two had issues with the bearings (I think again). But I applaude their efforts. And they will succeed.

As for the builders that choose not to discuss their methods, like I said, good for them. In a post in the Bluffman thread, there was one engine builder that drilled holes into the headers to see what color the flame was so he could have the perfect mixture. He sure as hell didn't want the other guy to know what he was doing.

Well, thats all I have for now. The HEALTHY race Merlin will once again rise out of the dark. And the builders today will make it happen. Just give them time, and who knows, maybe we will find out in September,

Go easy on me please.

Matt